190 The Enemy of the World: Episode Five

EPISODE: The Enemy of the World: Episode Five
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 190
STORY NUMBER: 040
TRANSMITTED: 20 January 1968
WRITER: David Whitaker
DIRECTOR: Barry Letts
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: CD: Doctor Who: The Enemy of the World
TELESNAPS: The Enemy of the World: Episode Five

This time Bruce does not fall for The Doctor pretending to be Salamander. They tell Bruce they have evidence on Salamander. He tells them that Farriah is dead. Benik is holding the unconscious Jamie & Victoria at the research centre. The Doctor talks Bruce into taking him to the research centre to get evidence. In the Underground base Colin is wanting to go outside. Swann finds a scrap of newspaper stuck to a crate "holiday liner sinks with the loss of many lives" He knows they have been lied to about the war. He accuses Salamander of being a murderer and forces Salamander to take him to the surface. When Salamander announces Swann is coming with him to the surface Colin is distraught that it wasn't him who was chosen. Benik interrogates Jamie and Victoria but is interrupted by "Salamander" and sent away. This turns out to be the Doctor. Salamander takes Swann into the tunnels above the base, but Swann wants to go to the surface. Astrid distracts the guards and flees allowing Kent to escape. While outside she hears cries for help and finds the injured Swann lying in a tunnel mouth. She asks him what has happened and he says he was attacked by a man named Salamander.

I'm still bowled over as to how Salamander's pulled this deception off especially as it comes crashing down so easily here. This episode rolls along nicely and you can feel things warming up for the story's conclusion. According to Barry Letts in his autobiography Who And Me this episode had to be re-written after it was discovered there were no scenes featuring guest star Mary Peach who plays Astrid.

Bill Kerr is the chief guest star in the serial, appearing as Giles Kent. For a story mainly set in Australia he's the only fair dinkum aussie in the cast. He's famous for appearing in Hancock's Half Hour, but was jettisoned when the series made the transition from radio to television. He's been in several films including the Dam Busters and Galipoli. Milton Johns is in his first Doctor Who role here being typically sinister as Benik. He'll be back as Guy Crayford in The Android Invasion, and Kelner in The Invasion of Time. The only reason I've heard of Andrew Staines, playing Benik's Sergeant, is that I've read the production subtitles on Planet of Spiders. He was a favourite actor of Barry Letts: indeed 4 of his 6 acting credits on imdb.com are Doctor Who roles with Barry Letts directing: He's also Goodge in Terror of the Autons, the Captain in Carnival of Monsters and finally Keaver, one of Lupton's gang, in Planet of the Spiders.

Remember Fraser Hines' cousin, Ian Hines, appearing as a guard in earlier episodes? Well in this and the next episode we have David Troughton, son of Patrick, also as a guard. He'll be back in a bit part in The War Games plus a starring role as King Peladon in the Curse of Peladon. He famously was Doctor Bob Buzzard in A Very Peculiar Practice (shortly to get a complete DVD release at long last) with Peter Davison before returning as Professor Hobbes in the 2008 New Series episode Midnight. One of my favourite actors he can do an excellent impression of his late father which he does to good effect narrating several of the Target audiobook readings.

189 The Enemy of the World: Episode Four

EPISODE: The Enemy of the World: Episode Four
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 189
STORY NUMBER: 040
TRANSMITTED: 13 January 1968
WRITER: David Whitaker
DIRECTOR: Barry Letts
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: CD: Doctor Who: The Enemy of the World
TELESNAPS: The Enemy of the World: Episode Four

Salamander decides to return to the research centre. The Doctor & Kent are waiting for Astrid who arrives then contacts them by vidphone, alerting them authorities before she switches to a secure transmission. Denes is dead: shot in the back during the escape attempt. Farrier has followed Astrid: she has come to see Kent with information for him. Farrier has been observed by the guards as well. Farrier tells how she was blackmailed into serving Salamander: she now has evidence that he engineered the schemes that Fedorin was accused of. Kent wants the Doctor to execute Salamander: he refuses. The guards close in on Kent's office but the occupants escape. Farriah is killed on the street after the escape. Salamander locks himself in the record room. He accesses a secret lift which takes him to hidden underground chambers. Bruce is angry with the guard outside the room that he can't get access to Salamander. Underground Salamander announces his return to those in the underground shelter. One of the men, Swann, meets with Salamander who claims he has been irradiated and must be decontaminated. He has brought them food back, and reports that it's terrible on the surface. Those in the shelter have been there for five years: they believe there has been a war on the surface which continues to this day. Those in the shelter are creating the natural disasters believing they are striking at those causing the war. Salamander tells them they cannot return to the surface till it's safe to do so. One of the survivors, Swann, wishes to go to the surface but his wife Mary reminds him that of the others that have made the journey only Salamander has returned. The Doctor is being made up to pose as Salamander when Bruce arrives with guards.

The Enemy of the World has had a three and a bit episode run up but finally during this episode it dives head first off the deep end. Up until now we've had a spy story with a little bit of a hint that Salamander has been causing some natural disasters. Then all off a sudden we've got a hidden underground base complete with survivors sheltering from the after effects of a (presumably nuclear) war who rely on Salamander venturing to the surface for their food. Bwah? Where did that come from? Not even a remote hint of this exists in earlier episode. As plot developments go this one is absolutely barking mad.

Six part (or longer) Doctor Who stories frequently have to do something different at some stage. Changing location is a good one: The first few episodes of the Daleks are in the city while the last deal with the attack. The The first half of Dalek Invasion of Earth is in central London before the action moves to the mines. Marco Polo, Keys of Marinus, The Chase & The Dalek Masterplan all change location most episodes. Evil of the Daleks travels from 60s London to Victorian Canterbury to Skaro. Inferno, famously, has a four episode alternate universe in the middle of it. Other stories introduce new characters or plot elements: The Optera in the Web Planet for example. But the new plot element here just comes from left field completely.

No Telesnaps exist for this episode: the BBC website has had a rough go using shots from other episodes. This episode doesn't feature Jamie or Victoria: Both actors were on holiday this week. Leaving the cast this episode is Carmen Munroe who plays Farriah. She's since gone on to extensive acting fame, including the wife in Desmond's, but I believe she is here the first female black actress in Doctor Who.

188 The Enemy of the World: Episode Three

EPISODE: The Enemy of the World: Episode Three
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 188
STORY NUMBER: 040
TRANSMITTED: 06 January 1968
WRITER: David Whitaker
DIRECTOR: Barry Letts
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - Lost In Time
TELESNAPS: The Enemy of the World: Episode Three

DVD time: we have pictures!

Salamander gives poison to Fedorin for him to administer to Denes. Bruce is surprised to see Jamie there dressed as a guard and wants to know what "Salamander" was talking to Kent about. Victoria assists Farriah and Grif the cook in the kitchen. Jamie arrives and tells Victoria that Salamander wants to replace the honest Denes with the weak Fedorin. Jamie speculates about the Earthquakes as Giles Kent outlines to the Doctor the same suspicions that he has, showing him television pictures of the destruction. The Doctor hides as Benik arrives, argues with Kent and has his caravan smashed up. The Doctor says he needs facts and hopes Jamie will provide them. Astrid arrives at the European palace with a message for Salamander. She sneaks away and speaks to Victoria and Jamie. She tells them to cause a diversion at 11 o'clock. Victoria takes Denes his food, but Fedorin bumps into her in the corridor and sends her away while he poisons the food. The Guard Captain recalls seeing Astrid to Salamander. Victoria stays with Denes. Fedorin tells Salamander he couldn't bring himself to poison Denes: They drink together and Fedorin is himself poisoned by Salamander. Jamie claims to have spotted someone in the garden: shooting starts and Astrid enters the palace to rescue Denes. Jamie & Victoria are brought to Salamander for interrogation. Bruce asks Salamander what's going on and Salamander finds out Bruce had seen him with Kent, Jamie and Victoria in Australia.

Enemy of the World 3 is the only episode of this story to exist. I first encountered it on the Troughton Years VHS and hated it. Very little Doctor, very little of the main villain, no Monsters. "What's this doing on the tape when I could be watching Web of Fear 1 and getting some more Yeti action?". In the context of the rest story I can see it makes sense and has a function. I still don't think it's the greatest example of sixties Doctor Who though.

A piece of film familiar to Doctor Who fans pops up in this episode: When Kent is showing the Doctor footage of the Volcanoes erupting a piece of stock footage is used. The same piece of film, albeit in colour, later resurfaces in Inferno as the background for the custom story and episode slides seen after the title sequence.

So given that it's so bad, why have we still got it? An episode being "good" or "bad" doesn't seem to have any effect on if they were kept or not. But Enemy of the World 3 does have some significance which *may* have contributed to a film telerecording of it being retained by the film & video library: it's the first episode of Doctor Who to be broadcast using the higher definition 625 line video tape. Previously Doctor Who had been broadcast off of 405 line video tape but this enhancement produced far better picture quality for those with a TV set capable of receiving it. BBC2 adopted the 625 line standard at launch in 1964 but it took BBC1 a further few years to convert to it. The BBC continued to transmit BBC1 using the 405 line standard all the way to 1985! Nowadays the 625 line standard is referred to as 576i (576 lines interlaced) The discrepancy in the two numbers is caused by the remaining 49 lines being used for other data like a time-code and teletext. No 405 line videotapes for Doctor Who survive, but many of the 625 line tapes do as we shall see shortly. But till the end of the Troughton era episodes will survive either as 16mm telerecordings or 35mm broadcast prints. Once Pertwee and colour arrive things will get much more complicated.

187 The Enemy of the World: Episode Two

EPISODE: The Enemy of the World: Episode Two
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 187
STORY NUMBER: 040
TRANSMITTED: 30 December 1967
WRITER: David Whitaker
DIRECTOR: Barry Letts
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: CD: Doctor Who: The Enemy of the World
TELESNAPS: The Enemy of the World: Episode Two

Bruce is taken in by the Doctor and leaves. The Doctor takes Jamie's advice and accepts the assignment. Astrid, Jamie & Victoria travel to the Central European Zone to meet the sympathetic controller Denes and to infiltrate Salamander's inner circle. At the research centre Benik is questioned about if he saw Salamander leave for Europe. Benik tried to speak with Salamander. Salamander talks to Denes about extinct Volcanoes in his territory and how he has a food record of predicting which may come to life. Farriah tells Salamander he has a call. Denes leaves but Fedorin stays behind talking with Salamander. Jamie & Victoria wait in a park: Astrid joins them and gives Jamie the card he needs to get into Salamander's palace. Fedorin talks with Farriah who reveals she is Salamander's food taster. Jamie arrives throwing Salamander's communication box over the balcony which explodes. The grateful Salamander admits Jamie to his guards. When he protests that he's here with his girlfriend Salamander says he'll find her a job too. He fetches Victoria, but they are seen with Astrid by the guard captain. Astrid meets with Denes. Salamander produces accusations against Fedorin blackmailing him into killing Denes in return for Fedorin succeeding him. The palace is shook by a volcanic eruption proving Salamander's predictions. Denes arrives and accuses Salamander of being responsible for the disaster. Bruce arrests Denes: Fedorin will be a witness against him.

The flavour of this story is becoming more like a James Bond spy story than Doctor Who with secret infiltrations and plotting but no monsters. But it's enjoyable enough so far as Troughton relishes his dual roles.

This episode, and the next, feature Ian Hines, the brother of Fraser Hines who plays Jamie, in the role of a guard. He's not the only relative of a cast member to pop up as a guard in this serial as we'll see in episodes 5 & 6. Ian Hines returns as a White Robot in the Mind Robber. Also appearing in the second & third episodes is George Pravda as Denes (pronounced Den-esh). He returns in the Mutants but is famous for his appearance as Castellan Spandrell in the Deadly Assassin.

186 The Enemy of the World: Episode One

EPISODE: The Enemy of the World: Episode One
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 186
STORY NUMBER: 040
TRANSMITTED: 23 December 1967
WRITER: David Whitaker
DIRECTOR: Barry Letts
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: CD: Doctor Who: The Enemy of the World
TELESNAPS: The Enemy of the World: Episode One

The Tardis materialises on a sea shore. They are observed by a group of men from a hovercraft who report what they see to Astrid. They defy her orders and attack but the Tardis crew are rescued by Astrid in her helicopter under orders from her boss Giles Kent. The helicopter is damaged and leaking fuel so she takes them to her nearby Bungalow where the Doctor treats her wounds. She tells him that the men have mistaken the Doctor for someone they hate. He resembles Salamander a would be world dictator. She wants to take the Doctor to see Kent. The thugs from the hovercraft arrive and a fire fight ensues killing one of them, while the other two die trying to escape in the helicopter. Giles Kent is amazed at the resemblance between the Doctor and Salamander. Kent leads a resistance against Salamander. He has been tracking men on his staff who have died. Salamander has tried to kill Kent too. Kent wishes for the Doctor to enter a research centre posing as Salamander. The Doctor refuses but they learn Salamander's security Bruce is coming forcing the Doctor to assume the identity of the dictator.

Welcome to another entry in the story sub genre "The Doctor's Double". Part of the plot with The Massacre, where Hartnell's Doctor failed to meet his double the Abbot of Amboise, was not knowing if the Abbot was the Doctor or not. Here *we're* certain who's the Doctor and who's Salamander, but the likeness is played on as a central element of the plot as Kent gets the Doctor to pose as Salamander. And the stakes have been upped too: while Hartnell's double was a powerful cleric, Troughton's is a would be world dictator. It's also a little amusing that I've ended up talking about a story featuring the Doctor's double just as the new series is in the middle of a 2-parter story featuring a double of the Doctor!

The story of how Barry Leopold Letts (the middle name will become important later) became first an actor and then a director has been told perfectly well elsewhere: Who And Me: The Memoir of Barry Letts is well worth a read. This is his first Doctor who directing role: four more follow, plus an extra uncredited one when someone else was taken ill. He's most famous though as the producer of Doctor Who for the first half of the Seventies.

It's interesting that Barry Setts makes his Who debut in this story and in the next one his script editor and great friend Terrance Dicks joins the show as assistant script editor.

185 The Ice Warriors: Six

EPISODE: The Ice Warriors: Six
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 185
STORY NUMBER: 039
TRANSMITTED: 16 December 1967
WRITER: Brian Hayles
DIRECTOR: Derek Martinus
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: VHS: Doctor Who: The Ice Warriors
TELESNAPS: The Ice Warriors: Six

The Doctor struggles with Zondal but he manages to fire the weapon before collapsing. Varga demands Clent's surrender but Clent negotiates with him for face to face talks. Walters struggles under the pressure and goes to smash the computer before Miss Garrett stuns him. The Doctor begins work on the Martian sonic cannon. Varga, Isbur and Rintan arrive at the base and start to talk with Clent. Walters starts to regain conciousness and aims a weapon at Varga but is killed by a warrior. Varga demands the fuel from the reactor. Miss Garrett is forced to run the Ioniser down to a safe level. The Doctor has modified the sonic cannon to affect liquids theorising that the Ice Warriors have a higher water content than humans. Penley awakens in the sickbay and leaves. Making his way to the control room he sees the warriors within and raises the temperature and humidity levels making things very uncomfortable for them even before the Doctor fires the sonic cannon at the base forcing their retreat. The Doctor destroys the sonic cannon controls for the ship before he and Victoria leave. When they return to the base Penley overrides the computer's decision and activates the Ioniser at full power forcing back the glacier and destroying the Martian vessel.

Yeah, that wasn't too bad an episode but you could see the "Humans triumph by making a decision over the computer" coming a mile off. There's a lot of mucking about and repetition in this story as a whole, I wonder if it might have worked better as a four parter rather than a six?

The Ice Warriors was novelised by it's author Brian Hayles and was the third Troughton story to see print. Almost every Doctor Who hardback in my local library advertised it on the back but they didn't have a copy so I was very keen to find it in paperback in the shops. To this day I'd swear it's better than the TV story. An Audiobook version is currently available. The Ice Warriors was released on Video in November 1998 for the show's 35th anniversary. The set contained all four surviving episodes, a partial telesnap reconstruction of the 2 missing ones, a cd of the soundtrack of both missing episodes, a documentary on the missing episodes and the sole surviving episode of the Underwater Menace. I was at this point getting increasingly keen to see Web of Fear part 1 so was annoyed that wasn't used instead of Underwater Menace. A Soundtrack CD of all 6 episodes was released in August 2005 with narration by Fraser Hines. This is one of those times when you look at something on the Internet and go "How much?" when you what people are paying for it now!

We've done well so far this season: 9 of the 16 episodes exist. Sadly only 4 episodes exist of the remaining 24 in the season.

184 The Ice Warriors: Five

EPISODE: The Ice Warriors: Five
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 184
STORY NUMBER: 039
TRANSMITTED: 09 December 1967
WRITER: Brian Hayles
DIRECTOR: Derek Martinus
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: VHS: Doctor Who: The Ice Warriors
TELESNAPS: The Ice Warriors: Five

The Doctor says he is a scientist and talks his way into being let out of the airlock. He meets Varga and offers to help them under certain conditions. He tells them the ioniser is not a weapon and is reunited with Victoria. Penley is pulling Jamie on a sled to the base when they realise a bear is stalking them. The Doctor tells the warriors that the humans are worried about the ioniser causing an explosion. The Martians in turn know if the ioniser is used and the glacier melted then their engines will be flooded. The Doctor suggests the Base would have to use the Ioniser at a certain point, aware they can hear what he's saying through the communicator. Varga seizes the communicator. Clent knows they're being told to take the risk of using the Ioniser, but is still reluctant fearing a nuclear explosion from the Martian ship. The Doctor discovers that the Ice Warrior ship has an Ion drive that wouldn't explode. The Martians demand to know about the base power supply and prepare to attack with the ship's cannon. Penley and Jamie are admitted to the base but argue with Clint and are stunned by the guards using tranquilliser guns. Zondal is ordered by Varga, via communicator, to attack the base but Victoria distracts him allowing The Doctor to throw the ammonia sulphate at him and attempt to wrestle him from the firing control....

Well my prediction in episode 3, while technically accurate, is downplaying quite how much I'm enjoying the last 3 episodes of this story. There are elements that are boring me, yes we get Clent and Janley are over dependant on the computer, referred to here as "the great computer" and almost treated like a deity! We get that Penley and Clent have clashed and there's a personal choice vs collective need argument going on. But it feels like we hear the same thing every episode. On the other hand I'm loving Troughton and Victoria with the Ice Warriors, that's superb stuff even if the Ice Warrior spaceship is a couple of consoles in the middle of the floor and some background flats.

When I was growing up and first became interested in Doctor Who (c1980/1), The Ice Warriors sat at number three in the monster pantheon, obviously behind the Daleks & Cybermen. They've slipped somewhat now: They didn't feature in the original series since 1974 whereas the Sontarans made three return appearances in classic Who after that date followed by some in the new series, which were likewise made by The Autons and The Silurians. The Ice Warriors are easily the biggest Classic Who monster yet to appear in the new series though.

Incidentally look at this and the three stories preceding it and compare the monsters in them:

Evil of the Daleks - Daleks
Tomb of the Cybermen - Cybermen
The Abominable Snowmen - Yeti
The Ice Warriors - Ice Warriors

That's FOUR of the original series greatest monsters in consecutive stories. You won't see that many returning monsters line up one after another like this ever again. The best we get is in 1972 when the Daleks, Ice Warriors and Sea Devils, the Silurians cousins, appear in Day of the Daleks, Curse of Peladon and The Sea Devils at the start of season 9 or in Season 12 in 1975 when the Sontarans, Daleks & Cybermen appear in the Sontaran Experiment, Genesis of the Daleks & Revenge of the Cybermen. And before anyone says something: The Master, like Davros, is a Villain, not a Monster - there's a difference!

183 The Ice Warriors: Four

EPISODE: The Ice Warriors: Four
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 183
STORY NUMBER: 039
TRANSMITTED: 02 December 1967
WRITER: Brian Hayles
DIRECTOR: Derek Martinus
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: VHS: Doctor Who: The Ice Warriors
TELESNAPS: The Ice Warriors: Four

The Ice Warriors monitor Victoria's conversation using her as bait. They are intrigued by Clent's interest in their engines. The Doctor tells her to return to the base. Turoc is sent to fetch her. The Doctor leaves for the glacier carrying a phial of ammonia sulphate that he theorises will make life comfortable for the Martians. Turoc catches up with Victoria, securing her in his vice like claws, but her screams cause an avalanche which kills the warrior, burying him, but with his hand still firmly round Victoria's arm. Jamie wakes in Storr's house and finds he's unable to walk. Varga theorises that the human base may use a fuel supply they can use to replenish their ship. Storr leaves the house to see if he can persuade the aliens to help with Jamie, sure he can reason with them. Penley follow him but quickly looses him in the glacier caves. Instead he finds the Doctor who comes back with him to see how Jamie is. Storr finds and frees Victoria. Hearing they oppose the scientists he takes her to them but since he has no knowledge of what they seek they kill him and take Victoria prisoner again. The Doctor tells Penley that Jamie needs treatment: Penley agrees to take him to the base while the Doctor goes to obtain the information needed about the Martian spaceship. Clent is struck with indecision: The computer won't give an answer without extra information, they won't get that until the Doctor returns and time is running out as the glaciers approach the base. The Doctor enters the Martian ship but is trapped within the airlock. He refuses to answer Varga's questions so Varga starts dropping the pressure within the airlock endangering the trapped Doctor.

Expectations suitably low after the last few episodes, this one worked OK. Yes there's lots of running around pointlessly in Ice Tunnels as the escaped Victoria gets captured again but this worked better for me than the first three.

Peter Barkworth, playing Clent, was a HUGE acting name and one of the biggest guest stars secured by the series so far. He went from the Ice Warriors off to Austria to film When Eagles Dare with Richard Burton & Clint Eastwood! Click on the link and see how many other former and future Doctor Who cast members you can spot there. Peter Sallis is now famous for being Norman Clegg in Last of the Summer Wine and the voice of Wallace, from the Wallace & Grommit films which co-written by Doctor Who scribe and K-9 co-creator Bob Baker. Scottish Actor Angus Lennie has played Storr in the story. He's known for his long running role as cook Shughie McFee in the soap opera Crossroads but will be back as the pub landlord in Terror of the Zygons. It will come as a surprise to no one to find out that Roy Skelton is the Computer Voice.

182 The Ice Warriors: Three

EPISODE: The Ice Warriors: Three
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 182
STORY NUMBER: 039
TRANSMITTED: 25 November 1967
WRITER: Brian Hayles
DIRECTOR: Derek Martinus
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: CD: Doctor Who: The Ice Warriors
TELESNAPS: The Ice Warriors: Three

Varga frees his four warriors from the ice: Zondal, Turoc, Isbur and Rintan. Arden and Jamie return to the base for the proper equipment. Storr won't believe Penley's tale of a warrior in the ice. They are visited by Miss Garret who tries, unsuccessfully, to get Penley to return to the base. He does however tell her to look at his notes on the Omega Factor to help with the ioniser. Zondal is ordered to locate the ship an excavate a cave as a trap. Penley's notes help the Doctor in his attempt to remedy the Ioniser. Entering the cave Arden and Jamie are shot down by the Ice Warriors. Clent cannot contact them and the Doctor is worried. Penley enters the cave after the Warriors have entered their ship and checks the bodies. Arden is dead but Jamie lives: he takes him back to the building he and Storr are living in. Victoria sneaks away from the Ice Warriors and, finding Arden's body, uses his communicator to contact the base. The Doctor is concerned when he hears what has happened but all Arden is interested in is details of the ship which leads Victoria to become hysterical. Meanwhile the Martians are training their cannon on Victoria and preparing to fire....

We've got arguing about if humans are better than computers, arguing about being able to choose a way of life over others needs, escaping from ice warriors and traipsing about in the snow. Sadly as I remember it that's the pattern for the rest of the story.

Lets have a look at the Martian members of the cast: Bernard Bresslaw, appearing as Ice Warrior leader Varga needs no introduction as we've all seen him in numerous Carry On films, usually playing a sidekick to Sid James. Most of the rest of the Ice Warriors have Doctor Who connections either in the past or future: Sonny Caldinez, as Turoc, was previously Kemel in Evil of the Daleks. He'll be main hench Ice Warrior from now on. Tony Harwood, playing Rintan, was a Cyberman in Tomb of the Cybermen and a Yeti in Abominable Snowmen so he's been in three stories on the trot. He's back as another Ice Warrior in Seeds of Death with Sonny Caldinez. Isbur is Michael Attwell's first Doctor Who appearance. He's probably best known as Kenny Beale in East Enders but he's got a memorable return Who appearance as Bates in Attack of the Cybermen. He appears to have been in just about everything and taking a peak at his CV I realise that I can remember his Sikes in the Classic Serial Olive Twist very well (Producer: Terrance Dicks) There's a few other Who personnel involved with that too!

Today marks six months that I've been producing this blog.

181 The Ice Warriors: Two

EPISODE: The Ice Warriors: Two
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 181
STORY NUMBER: 039
TRANSMITTED: 18 November 1967
WRITER: Brian Hayles
DIRECTOR: Derek Martinus
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: CD: Doctor Who: The Ice Warriors
TELESNAPS: The Ice Warriors: Two

The Ice Warrior rises, clubs Jamie to the floor, and takes Victoria hostage. The Doctor bursts into Clent's meeting and explains his concerns about the Ice Warrior having come from another world: If his spaceship is still in the glacier and is nuclear powered it could cause an explosion when exposed to the Ioniser. Jamie then arrives and tells them the creature has taken Victoria. The Warrior tells Victoria that he is Vaaga and comes from Mars. His ship crashed here millennia ago, his warriors are still trapped in the glacier and he wants to revive them. The computer suggests Arden should investigate the spaceship: Jamie goes with him. Storr is weakening so Penley decides to return to the base for medication. Arden has difficulty getting a radiation reading on the glacier. Vaaga forces Victoria to find him powerpacks to defrost his warriors. Clent enters the room and is clubbed to the floor by Vaaga who leaves with Victoria. Penley finds Clent and is treating him when the Doctor arrives allowing Penley to leave with the drugs. Back at the glacier Vaaga uses his sonic gun to start digging the warriors out. Storr shows signs of recovery after treatment. Vaaga begins thawing his crew.

Vaaga sounds great in this and I know that Bernard Bresslaw, the actor playing him, would have towered over Deborah Watling producing a good visual image. The base crew make me want to slap them for their reliance on the computer, but really that's what this story is about, the reliance on technology.

When the surviving episodes of the Ice Warriors were released on video a short reconstruction of episodes 2 & 3 was included along with a CD of the Soundtrack for these episodes. Hopefully when the DVD comes out a full reconstruction in the manner of Tenth Planet 4's vhs release will be attempted.

The Ice Warriors 2 & 3 are the only 2 episodes of the race's 22 episodes existence in Doctor Who that is missing. By contrast only two of the Yeti's 12 episodes remain. 22 Episodes from Dalek stories (totalling 81 episodes) are missing 9 Episodes from the 41 the the Cybermen star in are also missing.

180 The Ice Warriors: One

EPISODE: The Ice Warriors: One
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 180
STORY NUMBER: 039
TRANSMITTED: 11 November 1967
WRITER: Brian Hayles
DIRECTOR: Derek Martinus
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: VHS: Doctor Who: The Ice Warriors
TELESNAPS: The Ice Warriors: One

It's time to give the VCR it's first use in the Troughton era!

A computer voice announces evacuation as the limping Clent, leaning heavily on his stick, enters the control room. Miss Garret protest they need Scientist Penley, but is ignored. Arden and his team, Davis and Walters, are at work at a glacier when they discover a figure trapped in the Ice. Arden has them drill it out. Clent is trying to contact Arden without success. The Tardis materialises in the ice and snow outside a prefabricated dome. Jamie thinks they're still in Tibet and have materialised further up the mountain. They hide behind the Tardis as the raggedly dressed Storr and dishevelled Penley leave the dome clutching packages of food that they have stolen. The Doctor and friends enter the dome and find themselves within a preserved Georgian mansion. Finding the control room the Doctor intervenes preventing the base's reactor from exploding. Clent collapses and is taken to the medical unit, the Doctor and friends accompanying him. Arden has dug out what looks like a man in armour: Walters dubs it an Ice Warrior. Penley & Storr watch, Storr criticising the scientists. Davis comes outside and is killed by an avalanche which injures Storr, breaking his arm. Clent sets the Doctor a problem which he easily solves causing Clent to invite him to join their staff. A reduction in plant life, due to artificial food production, has led to a reduction in carbon dioxide levels which has caused the Earth to cool entering a "second" Ice Age. Arden brings the Ice warrior into the medical unit and sets it to slowly defrost. Clent & the Doctor go to a meeting leaving Jamie & Victoria behind as the Ice falls away from the Warrior and it awakens.....

Like Tomb of the Cybermen we've got a variation on a classic movie theme: here (also influencing Tomb) it's "something frozen in the ice". Everything else is dressing round that idea. But.... Oh dear the science in this makes my head hurt. For a start there's been considerably more than one Ice Age before. The explanation of Greenhouse Gasses being needed to maintain the Earth's temperature is pretty good apart from one awful error: plants don't give off Carbon Dioxide: they absorb it using photosynthesis which creates Oxygen as a by-product. Removing all the plants will cause Carbon Dioxide levels to RISE drastically. Deary me, elementary error, and although our understanding of Greenhouse Gasses has come on much in recent years I'm pretty certain that Photosynthesis was properly understood in 1967. I'll assume Kit Pedler, the show's unofficial scientific advisor, wasn't hanging round the Doctor Who office when this was made. THEN we have Arden's archaeological techniques: "I'll dig it out of the ice", fair enough, "then take it back to the base and warm it up". NO! Straight in the deep freeze to preserve it. Idiot. The idea of thinking it's a trapped and preserved Viking Warrior is a good one, and I believe similar preserved archaeological has been found in glaciers in this way. The Georgian mansion annoys me too: was it in Brian Hayles' script or did the crew nick an existing BBC set of a Georgian Mansion as a cost saving technique and stuff it full of computer equipment? I've been entertained by episodes of Doctor Who, bored by them and failed to follow them so far: this is the first time one's *really* annoyed me!

These episodes have their own special story title, writer and episode number captions, against a snowy background and accompanied by vocalisation, that appear after the title sequence. Interestingly the Episode Numbers appear as One, Two etc with no word, neither the Episode used from the Savages or Part used from Time Warrior. Yes, I know I got it wrong on every episode from the Savages to the end of the Macra Terror and labelled them as parts!

Still at least we can see it.

Have you tried down the back of the fridge? If you loose something it's almost always there!

Of all the stories concerning the episodes of Doctor Who "returned" to the BBC this is easily the funniest because the episodes never left the BBC at all. In 1988 BBC Enterprises were re-locating from their home in Villiers House. Prior to departure a search was made of the building and a pile of old film cans was found. Included was a missing episode of Adam Adamant lives, 4 episodes of The Ice Warriors labelled as episodes Two, and Four to Six, plus a film can for Fury from the Deep Six which sadly later turned out to have a completely different program in it. The can for Episode Two contained Episode One. At the time of it's finding The Ice Warriors became the most complete season 5 story.

Davis, who left us in this episode,is stuntman Peter Diamond who was in all three original Star Wars films: he's the Tusken Raider that attacks Luke in the first one. He's been in everything that's ever been made for television as a stuntman too.

Two episode CD break then we'll be back on the video

179 The Abominable Snowmen: Episode Six

EPISODE: The Abominable Snowmen: Episode Six
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 179
STORY NUMBER: 038
TRANSMITTED: 04 November 1967
WRITER: Mervyn Haisman &
Henry Lincoln
DIRECTOR: Gerald Blake
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: CD: Doctor Who: Abominable Snowmen
TELESNAPS: The Abominable Snowmen: Episode Six

The glowing substance pours from the cave down the mountainside. Travers tells The Doctor he remembers that Abbot Songsten took the pyramid up the mountain. Khrisong pursues the Abbot to Padmasambhava's sanctum where the Abbot kills him under Padmasambhava's hypnotic control. The monks turn on their Abbot, but the Doctor saves him saying that he has been controlled by Padmasambhava who in turn is under the influence of another. Travers and Ralpachan leave for the cave with the intention of destroying the pyramid. The Doctor learns from Songsten that the Great Intelligence has broken out of the cave and that the control device for the Yeti is behind Padmasambhava's throne in the sanctum. Padmasambhava summons three yeti to the monastery who pass Travers and Ralpachan on the mountainside. The Doctor gets Thomni to teach Victoria the Jewel of the Lotus prayer to protect her mind from Padmasambhava's control. Travers and Ralpachan discover the entire mountain top glowing: they can get nowhere near the cave and must return to the monastery. The monks leave the monastery, taking Songsten with them but leaving Thomni to assist the Doctor. The Doctor confronts Padmasambhava who attacks him with his psychic powers, while Jamie & Thomni attempt to smash the yeti control. Victoria tries to prevent Padmasambhava moving Yeti into the room, but can't. They enter and are about to kill the Doctor when Jamie and Thomni smash their control mechanism causing the Yeti to explode. Travers enters and shoots at Padmasambhava who catches the bullets. The Doctor instructs Jamie and Thomni to look for a pyramid which they find and destroy, blowing up the area of mountain covered by the secretion from the cave and severing the Intelligence's link to Padmasambhava allowing the old man to finally die in peace. The monks are summoned back to the monastery as the Doctor and his friends walk up the mountainside to the Tardis with Travers. He sees a real Yeti and runs off after it leaving the Doctor and friends to depart.

That's just brilliant, loved it, what a great climax to a superb story. I think that's my favourite Who story so far, certainly the best of the missing ones. Like I said in the previous episode it just sounds so good. There's not a duff performance in there. Fabulous. The production team thought so as evidenced by a sequel being commissioned immediately. The Doctor Who series would later return to Budhist themes periodically during Jon Pertwee's time as Doctor Who.

Quite rightly Abominable Snowmen was the first Troughton story to be novelised, Terrance Dick's third novelization after The Auton Invasion and Day of the Daleks. It's either the second or third Troughton book I bought after The Cybermen (Moonbase) and, perhaps, The Ice Warriors. An audio CD of the book, as read by Patrick's son David Troughton is available, and the short clip I've heard sounds superb. A reissue of the novel itself is due shortly.

The soundtrack for the story has been released as an CD, in the Yeti Attack 2 pack with it's sequel, Web of Fear, and as an MP3 CD with Web of Fear again.

178 The Abominable Snowmen: Episode Five

EPISODE: The Abominable Snowmen: Episode Five
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 178
STORY NUMBER: 038
TRANSMITTED: 28 October 1967
WRITER: Mervyn Haisman &
Henry Lincoln
DIRECTOR: Gerald Blake
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: CD: Doctor Who: Abominable Snowmen
TELESNAPS: The Abominable Snowmen: Episode Five

Padmasambhava beckons Victoria in but she is startled when sees the Yeti gameboard. He hypnotises her, then moves four Yeti models into the area of the map showing the courtyard of the monastery. Travers regains conciousness but is still rambling about what he has seen. They hear the roar of the Yetis marauding through the monastery, as the Doctor takes a reading on his device. Rinchen is searching for Victoria when he comes across two Yeti who knock the Buddha statue down crushing him. The damage done Padmasambhva moves the Yeti back to the mountain. He takes control of Victoria and sends her out with the Ghanta to speak to the monks who he instructs to leave the monastery and for their visitors to be freed. When the Doctor is reunited with Victoria she repeatedly tells him that there is danger and they must flee. Deducing she has been hypnotically programmed he goes to see Padmasambhava, who he met on his previous visit 300- years previously when he was entrusted with the Ghanta. Padmasambhava tells him how he encountered the Great Intelligence on the astral plane before seemingly dying. However when the Doctor leaves he opens his eyes and comes back to life. The Doctor regresses Victoria hypnotically and removed the commands she's been given. Leaving her with Jamie, the Doctor and Travers journey up the mountain to take another reading. As they travel and hide from Yeti, Travers begins to feel a sense of deja vu. The Doctor realises from his reading that Padmasambhava is responsible for their flight as Travers finally remembers about the cave and the glowing substance emerging from it.

I'm sorry if you're getting bored with me saying this every episode but I'm loving this story. It's got better for me each time I've listened to it. One of the reasons for this is the sound on the story: from the lovely echoey noise in the Monastery, the wind on the mountainside and the two different tones used by Padmasambhava it all just works nicely. The monks you'd expect to be quite similar but the main ones are easily distinguishable just from their vocal characteristics. It helps that there's an existing episode early on that shows most of what's in the story giving you a decent visual reference. About the only things you don't see in 2 are Padmasambhva and his sanctum: my vision of what they looked like was completely different to the reality of the telesnaps for this episode.

The main creative forces behind this story are new to the show. Mervyn Haisman & Henry Lincoln had started writing together relatively recently and this is their first joint television credit. Lincoln has had an interesting career post Who, co writing a controversial book The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail that was the basis of the best selling novel The DaVinci code. One book I have (and let's name names: It's About Time volume 2) credited Haisman with creating the Onedin Line but the interweb says that was Cyril Abraham but Haisman served as a script editor on the show.

Gerard Blake has a massive television directing CV which includes another Doctor Who story, the Invasion of Time, in 1978. His gap between directorial assignments for the show is the largest in the original run of Doctor Who.

177 The Abominable Snowmen: Episode Four

EPISODE: The Abominable Snowmen: Episode Four
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 177
STORY NUMBER: 038
TRANSMITTED: 21 October 1967
WRITER: Mervyn Haisman & Henry Lincoln
DIRECTOR: Gerald Blake
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: CD: Doctor Who: Abominable Snowmen
TELESNAPS: The Abominable Snowmen: Episode Four

The Yeti fights it's way out of the monastery, with Victoria & Thomni opening the gates freeing it to avoid further injury and bloodshed. The Doctor, travelling with Jamie to the Tardis, doesn't like the eerie silence. Travers sees Songsten take the recovered control sphere from some Yeti into their cave. The Doctor and Jamie find a Yeti guarding the Tardis. As Padmasambhava communicates with the Great Intelligence, Songsten places the sphere with the others in the cave completing a circle. The glass pyramid he has brought from Padmasambhava goes in the centre and starts to glow. He leaves with his Yeti escort allowing Travers to enter the cave. Meanwhile the Doctor is considering the Yeti guard at the Tardis

Jamie: Have you thought up some clever plan, Doctor?
The Doctor: Yes, Jamie, I believe I have.
Jamie: What are you going to do?
The Doctor: Bung a rock at it.

When it fails to react The Doctor walks up to it, unscrews it's chest panel and removes the control sphere which he gets Jamie to hold as he hunts for the tracking equipment in the Tardis. In the cave Travers sees he pyramid cracks open spewing a glowing foam into the cave. The Doctor emerges from the Tardis with the tracking device as the sphere Jamie is holding activates. They block the Yeti's chest cavity with a rock deactivating the sphere and take it with them. In the Monastery, Thomni and Victoria are jailed for letting the Yeti go since the monks suspect them of conspiring with the Yeti. Songsten's 3 Yeti escort leaves him and returns up the mountain. Ralpachan opens the gate to Songsten who again hypnotises him to conceal his entry to the Monastery. Padmasambhava congratulates him, telling him the Great Intelligence has begun to take corporeal form. The three Yeti that were with Songsten surround Jamie & The Doctor who escape but are forced to leave the sphere behind which the Yeti retrieve. Victoria feigns illness and breaks out of her cell. The Doctor & Jamie, closely followed by a hysterical Travers, return to the monastery and are arrested on Songsten's orders. The Monks hunt for Victoria as they prepare to abandon the monastery on Padmasambhava's orders. Songsten relieves the guard on the gate, opening it as Padmasambhava moves four Yeti models to the monastery. Victoria hovers on the edge of his sanctuary and he summons her inside....

Just fabulous again. The thing that makes this episode stand out from the others is the interaction between The Doctor & Jamie on the mountain. They're just fabulous together without anyone to interrupt them!

A small amount of footage of the Yeti in this episode remains that was used in other programs. This can be found on the Doctor Who - Lost In Time DVD set along with some colour cine film taken at the location shoot by the story's director.

A Doctor Who staple for the next few years makes it's debut in this episode: Please welcome the foam machine! Any excuse and the special effects team will be pumping foam all over the set or location!

Many of the character names in this story are taken from Buddhist history & mythology. Padmasambhava was a 8th century AD guru, also known as Guru Rinpoche and gives his names to two characters here. There may be others as well, but my knowledge of Budhism is a little limited! When Terrance Dicks novelised the story his friend, and practising Zen Buddhist, Barry Letts advised him to change some of the names.

And for those who doubt that I can listen to an episode of Doctor Who before I post the blog in the mornings, I listened to this episode at 5:30 am, having been woken by my wife who'd been in with our son all night. OK so I listened to it 22 days before I posted this but .....

176 The Abominable Snowmen: Episode Three

EPISODE: The Abominable Snowmen: Episode Three
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 176
STORY NUMBER: 038
TRANSMITTED: 14 October 1967
WRITER: Mervyn Haisman & Henry Lincoln
DIRECTOR: Gerald Blake
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: CD: Doctor Who: Abominable Snowmen
TELESNAPS: The Abominable Snowmen: Episode Three

The Doctor works out that the Yeti's control unit was dislodged in the fight but Khrisong won't let him go outside to find it, nor will he let Travers leave to search for the Yeti. Victoria, seeing the shape of the chest cavity, wonders if the sphere they found in the caves was a control sphere too, sparking a search for the missing sphere. Ralpachan hasn't seen it but he did let Travers out of the Monastery after he said Khrisong had given him permission. Sapan has constructed a "spirit trap" round the immobilised Yeti, which Abbot Songsten congratulates him on while Khrisong and Rinchen argue as to whether the Yeti should have been brought inside. Khrisong is furious when the Doctor arrives and tells him Travers has left. The Abbot falls into a trance and is summoned by Padmasambhava, and this sparks Victoria's curiosity when she finds out that none of the monks have ever seen the elderly master who dwells in the monastery. In the sanctum Padmasambhava moves a Yeti model on a map to join two more. Outside Travers sees two Yeti joined by a third. Padmasambhava believes the Doctor may endanger their plan: he moves two Yeti models to the Monastery, mirrored buy two Yeti who come down off the mountain. Khrisong is searching for the Control Sphere outside the gates and find it buried in the mud but the two Yeti arrive, attacking him and retrieving the sphere. The Doctor humorously comments

They came to get their ball back!

while in his sanctum Padmasambhava observes that

It would seem that the Yeti have caused some little upset at the gate

before dispatching the Abbot to go to meet the Yeti. He gives him a glass pyramid

Take it to the caves. Then the Great Intelligence will focus upon this planet. Soon it will begin to grow and at last take on physical form. At last its wanderings in space will be at an end. My work will then be done

Khrisong says the sphere emitted a sound and the Doctor realises they can track the signal. Khrisong gives the Doctor & Jamie leave to fetch the equipment from the Tardis. They leave without telling Victoria who searches for them. She makes her way to the inner sanctum as the missing sphere edges towards the captured Yeti. Songsten hypnotising Ralpachan and so passes through the gate unobserved. Padmasambhava sends uses his hypnotic tone to send Victoria away. She returns to the room with the Yeti in just as the sphere reaches it activates the robotic beast.

Episode 2 looked good, but 3 sounds even better. I'd love t see this one! We now have a clearer idea what's going on: The Yeti are robots controlled by Padmasambhava who using the Abbot. Padmasambhava serves the great intelligence who wants to come to Earth and gain corporal form. But the Doctor, Travers and the Monks know none of this and suspicion passes from the Doctor to Travers to elsewhere as the Doctor tries to gain the monk's trust. Sapan's description of the robot Yeti as "a devil with his armour on the inside" is a fantastic one, and the concept of the game board map with miniature figurines controlling the Yeti is a striking image and one that will be recycled later in the show's history.

Amongst the cast we have to start with a famous name who's *NOT* in the story Ralpachan is played by David Baron. "David Baron" is the stage name of playwright Harold Pinter. These are not one and the same: Pinter abandoned the use of the Baron name to perform under in 1959. Norman Jones is perhaps the most familiar face to Who fans in the credited cast returning as Major Baker in Doctor Who and the Silurians and Hieronymous in The Masque of Mandragora, while Abbot Songsten is played by Charles Morgan and returns as the Gold Usher in director Gerard Blake's other Doctor Who story The Invasion of Time.

However amongst the extras in this story we've got Pat Gorman. He's already been in Doctor Who as an Alien Delegate in Mission to the Unknown and a soldier in The War Machines and I failed to mention him in either appearance! He's an uncredited walk on here, so presumably one of the monks. His future credits include a Cyberman in The Invasion, a Military Policeman in The War Games, the Silurian Scientist in Doctor Who and the Silurians, a Primord in Inferno, the Auton Leader in Terror of the Autons, a Primitive, the Voice, Long, and a Colonist in Colony in Space, a Sea Devil in The Sea Devils, a UNIT soldier in The Three Doctors, a UNIT Corporal in Invasion of the Dinosaurs, a UNIT soldier at the start of the bizarre episode long chase in part 2 of The Planet of the Spiders, a Thal Soldier in Genesis of the Daleks, a Soldier in The Masque of Mandragora, a Medic in The Invisible Enemy, a Pilot in The Armageddon Factor, and as uncredited as Grogan in Enlightenment. He may well have been in more episodes: spotting Pat Gorman is a popular game amongst fans and DVD commentary participants!

Four of the Cybermen in the previous tale, Tomb of the Cybermen, are back as a different monster in this story: John Hogan, Richard Kerley, Tony Harwood & Reg Whitehead are the four actors who play Yeti in The Abominable Snowmen. Interestingly none of them return as Yeti in their second appearance, The Web of Fear, but another former Cyberman from the Moonbase, John Levene, is inside a Yeti there!

175 The Abominable Snowmen: Episode Two

EPISODE: The Abominable Snowmen: Episode Two
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 175
STORY NUMBER: 038
TRANSMITTED: 07 October 1967
WRITER: Mervyn Haisman & Henry Lincoln
DIRECTOR: Gerald Blake
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - Lost In Time
TELESNAPS: The Abominable Snowmen: Episode Two

And we're onto disc 3 of the Lost in Time set!

Jamie knocks down the prop holding the roof up burying the Yeti. They take a sphere from the pyramid to show the Doctor but as they leave the buried Yeti starts to move. The Doctor is visited by the Monk Thomni who has been sent to take him to Khrisong. The Doctor tells him to look in the straw of the cell as Khrisong arrivces to take him away. Thomni finds the Ghanta hidden there. Victoria and Jamie are chased down the mountainside by the Yeti. Khrisong verbally clashes with Rinchen & Saphan about what he plans for the Doctor. The Doctor is tied to the gate as bait for the Yeti. Thomni takes the Ghanta to Abbot Songsten, but hears another voice: Their master Padmasbhava. Padmasbhava now knows the Doctor has returned since the Ghanta has been bought back. Jamie & Victoria meet Travers on the Mountain. They get him to take them to the Monastery in return for showing him where the Yeti's cave is. Padmasbhava questions Thomni and instructs him to have The Doctor released and treated well. The unseen Padmasbhava's hypnotic tone convinces Thomni that his orders come from the Abbot and not Padmasbhava. When Thomni leaves Padmasbhava speaks in a more sinister tone to the Abbot about the Great Plan. Jamie, Victoria and Travers arrive, and Travers tells the monks that he was mistaken. Thomni arrives with the orders from the Abbot and Khrisong frees the Doctor. The sinister Padmasbhava tells the Abbot nothing must stop their preparations as there is little time left. Jamie & Victoria show the silver sphere to the Doctor who asks them about the Yeti. Travers tells them that the Yeti are shy and elusive creatures. Three Yeti are sighted from the monastery. Jamie has a plan to capture it so the Doctor & Victoria retreat into the Monastery. Jamie spreads a net on the floor at the gate: they batter the Yeti and haul the net up, suddenly noticing it has stopped moving. Buried in the mud is a bleeping & wiggling silver sphere which has fallen from the Yeti. A monk finds Jamie's sphere in the monastery and places it by the Budha statue. The Doctor discovers the Yeti is a robot and there's something missing from inside it's chest. Outside the Monastery the buried sphere admits a bleeping call, returned by Jamie's sphere inside which starts moving....

Episode 2 of The Abominable Snowmen may be my favourite surviving episode of sixties Doctor Who: Great location work, superb dimly lit studio sets (and we'll see much later how important decent lighting is when it all goes wrong in the 80s), good monsters, a sinister presence and even little stuff like the spheres communicating with each other and the moving one at the feet of the Budha. The plot ticks along nicely in this episode resolving certain aspects of the first episode and introducing new elements, notably the master Padmasbhava. This episode works superbly and makes me wonder how much better episode 1 would be with the pictures.

Abominable Snowman 2 is the only episode of this story to exist. It was returned to the BBC in 1982 from a collector named Roger Stevens via Ian Levine. Stevens had bought a number of films from a former BBC employee who had "acquired" them. Levene asserted the both Snowman 2 and another episode, Invasion of the Dinosaurs 1 were missing from the archives. Levene returned the copy of Snowmen 2, but held on to Invasion of the Dinosaurs 1 for a little while longer, as a potential bargaining chip is any other sources of missing episodes emerged. That was returned to the BBC in mid 1983. See pages 195-9 of Wiped! Doctor Who's Missing Episodes by Richard Molesworth for more details.

Abominable Snowman 2 was released on video as part of Doctor Who - the Troughton Years in 1991 along with Enemy of the World 3 and Space Pirates 2. It's by some distance the best episode on the tape. A second surviving Yeti episode, The Web Of Fear 1, would have to wait many more years for it's VHS release in 2003 as part of the final Doctor Who VHS release. Both episodes can be found in the Doctor Who - Lost In Time DVD set.

The surviving copy of episode two has a sound fault, present on all off air recordings of the story. Towards the end of the episode The Doctor is examining the Yeti and is meant to say "You were right about one thing Victoria — this creature certainly doesn't seem to be flesh and blood". The audio is missing for the first half of the sentence until the middle of the word Victoria. The fault was disguised for the VHS release but is patched using other surviving Troughton dialogue for the CD and VHS releases.

174 The Abominable Snowmen: Episode One

EPISODE: The Abominable Snowmen: Episode One
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 174
STORY NUMBER: 038
TRANSMITTED: 30 September 1967
WRITER: Mervyn Haisman &
Henry Lincoln
DIRECTOR: Gerald Blake
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: CD: Doctor Who: Abominable Snowmen
TELESNAPS: The Abominable Snowmen: Episode One

High on a Himalayan mountain the explorer Edwards Travers sleeps in his tent. He is awoken by screams, and calls for his fellow explorer John. Emerging from the tent he is confronted by a furry creature that twists his rifle and throws it away as Travers flees. The Tardis has landed in the Himalayas: The Doctor is pleased to be back in Tibet and looks for The Ghanta, a holy bell left with him many years ago. The Doctor steps outside in a huge fir coat. Jamie finds a scimitar in a chest which he's taken with before mistaking the Doctor for a hairy beast when he sees him on the monitor. Victoria finds the Ghanta, but the Doctor is concerned by a huge footprint he finds outside the Tardis. The Doctor leaves Jamie & Victoria in the Tardis as he takes the ghanta to the Det Sen monastery. The Doctor is observed on his journey by a giant hairy beast. Jamie & Victoria get bored and go outside to explore. The Doctor finds the remains of Travers' campsite and John's body. Jamie & Victoria find the huge footprints and follow them. The Doctor arrives at the Monastery, now carrying Travers rucksack, and finds it seemingly deserted. He enters, standing before a Buddha statue where he's ambushed by a group of warrior Monks. Travers is with them and, seeing his rucksack, is convinced the Doctor murdered his friend causing the Monks to seize him. Their leader Khrisong imprisons him. Victoria & Jamie have followed the tracks to a cave. While inside something rolls a boulder across the exit sealing them in. Travers comes to see the Doctor accusing him of wanting to steal his discovery: He believes he is near to finding the Yeti. The Doctor suggests that Yeti attacked Travers but he says they are shy, timid creatures. The Doctor points out he hasn't the strength to do the damage Travers attacker did. Krisong, Rinchen and Sapan discuss if the Doctor is responsible for the deaths of John and 4 of their brothers when they had previously thought the Yeti responsible. Khrisong decides to put the Doctor to the test. Jamie & Victoria enter a chamber which has a pyramid of silver spheres in it but they are cornered by the creature that has returned: It is a Yeti which snaps Jamie's sword in two.

Every so often Doctor Who wanders off and successfully raids older sources for ideas. Having done "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" and "Curse of the Pharoahs" in recent stories we now get onto The Abominable Snowman. That instantly implies the Himalayas giving us the setting, and when you throw a British explorer in then you've virtually got the first episode written for you. This episode sounds OK without being anything special but better is to come and fortunately we can see what it looks like as the next episode is on DVD!

Cast as the explorer Edward Travers is actor Jack Watling who already had an extensive acting CV. His daughter Debbie was already working on Doctor Who playing The Doctor's companion Victoria Waterfield.

Extensive location filming is undertaken for this story at Nant Ffrancon Pass in Snowdonia, North Wales. The area had previously served as the location for Carry on up the Khyber, also fictionally set within the Himalayas.

173 The Tomb of the Cybermen: Episode Four

EPISODE: The Tomb of the Cybermen: Episode Four
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 173
STORY NUMBER: 037
TRANSMITTED: 23 September 1967
WRITER: Kit Pedler & Gerry Davis
DIRECTOR: Morris Barry
SCRIPT EDITOR: Victor Pemberton
PRODUCER: Peter Bryant
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - The Tomb Of The Cybermen

Jim Callum throws himself in front of the Doctor taking most of the blast in his shoulder. In the chambers bellow, many of the Cybermen retreat to the tomb they occupied leaving the Controller with a smaller group of Cybermen. Klieg opens the hatch and summons the Controller and the partially cybertised Toberman to the surface. The Controller uses the revitalising machine to repower his weakening form. Attempts by the Doctor and Jamie to trap him in it fail. Controlling Toberman he gets him to strike Klieg down and taking his gun shoots Kaftan dead. Toberman flings the Controller into the console damaging him. The Doctor goes bellow with Toberman to seal the Cybermen in their Tombs but while everyone is tending to the wounded Callum, Klieg sneaks bellow and halts the process. The Doctor engages him about his plans for world domination

The Doctor: Don't you see what this is going to mean to all the people who come to serve Klieg the all powerful? Why, no country, no person would dare to have a single thought that was not your own. Eric Klieg's own conception of the, of the way of life!
Eric Klieg: Brilliant! Yes, yes, you're right. Master of the world.
The Doctor: Well now I know you're mad, I just wanted to make sure.

Klieg is ambushed by one of the remaining Cybermen and killed, while the Cyberman is killed by Toberman. They return to the surface, the Doctor electrifying the doors, hatch and console but as they leave the Controller reactivates and attempts to prevent them closing the doors. Toberman shoves them closed at the cost of his life as he's electrocuted with the doors completing the circuit as they close. Parry, the sole survivor of the expedition proper, leaves with Hopper, Callum & the rest of the rocket ship's crew.

Great stuff again. The Cybermen retreating to the tomb has had some flack over the years but from the Controller's behaviour afterwards it should be obvious they've got energy problems and their plan relied on getting to the revitalising machine quickly. The dying Cyberman, with foam emerging from it's battered chest unit took flack for the BBC at the time for being too gruesome. I think Tomb's a cracking story: decent monsters & villains, fabulous sets and some really good lines for Troughton. But since it's 1992 return it's taken a bit of a battering from fans compared to it's previous high reputation. Don't care. I love it.

Tomb of the Cybermen, by Gerry Davis, was one of the first Troughton stories I encountered, possibly THE first. My local library had two Troughton books, both in Hardback: this was one, Web of Fear was the other. Their copy of Web now sits on my bookshelf thanks to a withdrawn book sale. It's complete with a once again inaccurate cover showing, like the Cybermen (the Moonbase's novelization) the wrong sort of Cybermen: both covers feature the Invasion version.

In 1983 the BBC held a vastly over subscribed 20th anniversary Celebration convention at Longleat House in Wiltshire. During the weekend a poll was taken to determine which story would be the first released on video. Tomb of the Cybermen won. One problem: Tomb didn't exist at the time. So the BBC went for the next best thing that did exist: Revenge of the Cybermen. The first Revenge video release upheld the "wrong Cybermen on the cover" tradition by appearing with an Earthshock Cyberman on it's front! We'll forgive them the neon logo as that was in use by the series at the time!

As we've said previously, Tomb was eventually released on video on May 4th 1992. It had been planned as a missing story audio release but the story's recovery temporarily shelved that. The audio cassette, with narration by Jon Pertwee, was eventually released in June 1993. Tomb's recovery affecting the release schedules was rumoured to put a stop on further missing episode releases presumably because the BBC thought more recoveries were imminent. I'm not sure this theory holds up: The audio cassettes were selling very, very well at the time. A new Tomb of the Cybermen Soundtrack CD was released in 2006, with new narration by Frazer Hines, completing Season 5 on BBC CD.

Tomb of the Cybermen was released on DVD on the 14th January 2002 and was the first release to feature Patrick Troughton or, indeed, black and white material. This release wasn't VIDFIRED to restore the video look due to the process being in it's infancy at the time. However Planet of the Giants was already out on Video and does use the VIDFIRE process and there's a small Easter Egg of Vidfired material on this release. Tomb of the Cybermen was the earliest Doctor Who DVD to be deleted. A new version, with VIDFIRE and loads of new extras is due in the Revisitations III boxset to be released in late 2011.

172 The Tomb of the Cybermen: Episode Three

EPISODE: The Tomb of the Cybermen: Episode Three
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 172
STORY NUMBER: 037
TRANSMITTED: 16 September 1967
WRITER: Kit Pedler & Gerry Davis
DIRECTOR: Morris Barry
SCRIPT EDITOR: Victor Pemberton
PRODUCER: Peter Bryant
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - The Tomb Of The Cybermen

An accident while editing Tomb of the Cybermen episode two meant it has jumped out of sequence - see here for the entry for that episode.

The Cybermen explain their plans for the travellers: They will be Cybertised and sent to Earth to create a new race of Cybermen. Victoria returns with Captain Hopper & Jim Callum. They work the hatch controls out, but Kaftan stops them from opening it until she is overpowered. Once the hatch is opened, Captain Hopper goes bellow and lets of smoke bombs allowing the Doctor, Parry & Jamie to escape. Toberman is captured by the Cybermen but Klieg makes his way to the surface and is let out the Tomb but then imprisoned with Kaftan in the weapons test room. Hopper returns to the rocket to finish repairs while Callum remains with the party. Kaftan & Klieg work on freeing the weapon held by the dummy Cyberman. The Doctor wakes late for his watch shift: Victoria has let him sleep. They talk about his great age and family

The Doctor: Are you happy with us, Victoria?
Victoria: Yes, I am. At least, I would be if my father were here.
The Doctor: Yes, I know, I know.
Victoria: I wonder what he would have thought if he could see me now.
The Doctor: You miss him very much, don't you?
Victoria: It's only when I close my eyes. I can still see him standing there, before those horrible Dalek creatures came to the house. He was a very kind man, I shall never forget him. Never.
The Doctor: No, of course you won't. But, you know, the memory of him won't always be a sad one.
Victoria: I think it will. You can't understand, being so ancient.
The Doctor: Eh?
Victoria: I mean old.
The Doctor: Oh.
Victoria: You probably can't remember your family.
The Doctor: Oh yes, I can when I want to. And that's the point, really. I have to really want to, to bring them back in front of my eyes. The rest of the time they... they sleep in my mind and I forget. And so will you. Oh yes, you will. You'll find there's so much else to think about. To remember. Our lives are different to anybody else's. That's the exciting thing, that nobody in the universe can do what we're doing.

As Victoria goes to sleep the Doctor notices Cybermats moving round the room. Everyone is woken and moves back to the control console where The Doctor runs a cable round them electrifying it and destroying the Cybermats. Klieg and Kraftan enter the room threatening the party, and then a shot is fired....

That's cracking stuff: plenty of action, some sinister monsters and that superb chat between the Doctor and Victoria during the quiet of the night. Fabulous, loved it. OK you can see the Kirby wires holding Toberman up as the Cyberman flings him across the room but it's a small fault and one that probably wasn't visible at the time.

Onto the actors within ranks of the Cybermen in this story: Four of the Cybermen in this story will be back as a different monster in the very next story: John Hogan, Richard Kerley, Tony Harwood & Reg Whitehead are the four actors playing Yeti in The Abominable Snowmen. Interestingly none of them are Yeti in their second appearance, The Web of Fear! Reg Whitehead has already been a Cybermen in The Tenth Planet and The Moonbase, and in addition to the aforementioned Yeti in The Abominable Snowmen he also plays the doomed explorer John in the opening moments of the first episode. He gets a name check in this story when Klieg refers to the fictional "Whitehead Logic" He's not the last member of cast or crew to get mentioned on screen in a Doctor Who story either! It's Tony Harwood's first Doctor Who appearance here, and after his Yeti next story he'll be back as the Martian Rintan in the The Ice Warriors, in The Seeds of Death as another unnamed Ice Warrior) and in The Ambassadors of Death as Flynn. Charles Pemberton returns as an Alien Technician in The War Games - I'd like to think he's related to acting Script Editor Victor Pemberton but can't find any evidence that he is. The Cybermen Voices are all provided by Peter Hawkins in his penultimate Doctor Who role. The leader of th4e Cybermen, the Cyber-Controller, is played by Michael Kilgarriff who'll be back as an Ogron in Frontier in Space, and the Robot in Tom Baker's debut story, Robot, before returning as the Cyber-Controller in Attack of the Cybermen. In the intervening 18 years he'd put on a pound or 2 and thus the Attack Controller is a littler porkier than he should be just for the sake of a nod to the fans out there. A different Controller has returned in new Doctor Who but uses the exposed brain idea suggested by the enlarged cranium of the Controller seen here.

In late Jan/early Feb 1992 one was having a tinsy bit of a bad run: I'd been involved in a serious car accident (write off), my then girlfriend and I had split up and I had fallen down a flight of stairs further injuring my already damaged back. All in the space of 2 weeks. The University health centre decided to admit me and I spent nearly a week as their guest with little contact with the outside world. (worse was to follow: a week later I went down with acute appendicitis and was hospitalised!) Fortunately some friends brought me a paper in most day (The Telegraph: Christopher Martin-Jenkins was writing their cricket and the crossword & obits were good) There one day in the paper was the news that The Tomb of the Cybermen had been found. Much rejoicing was heard in fandom, there's a very good issue of Celestial Toyroom, the Doctor Who Appreciation Society magazine commemorating the recovery.

On May 4th that year, my Birthday as it happens, Tomb was released on video (alongside Claws of Axos: Twin Dilemma had been intended for release, this then became a Woolworths exclusive so some time, also released that day). Checks calender..... May 4th 1992 was a bank holiday and back then most shops didn't open on bank holidays so I'm guessing we didn't get a copy till the next day. Off we all trooped to the Woolworths in Egham, handed our cash over and sat down to watch a Doctor Who story we'd never seen before. It was the first time I'd seen the sixties Cybermen as well: the surviving episodes of The Moonbase and The Wheel in Space weren't released till 6th July that same year as part of Cybermen: The Early Years. I loved Tomb when I first saw it, still do. The only thing that bugged me at the time were the voice, I really didn't like them and still don't to this day.

170 The Tomb of the Cybermen: Episode One

EPISODE: The Tomb of the Cybermen: Episode One
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 170
STORY NUMBER: 037
TRANSMITTED: 02 September 1967
WRITER: Kit Pedler & Gerry Davis
DIRECTOR: Morris Barry
SCRIPT EDITOR: Victor Pemberton
PRODUCER: Peter Bryant
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - The Tomb Of The Cybermen

Welcome to Doctor Who season 5, the famous season of monsters, reckoned by some to be the greatest season of Doctor Who ever. And what away to start: A Troughton story that exists in it's entirety! Huzzah! We're on DVD too!

We kick off with another great "Start the series by explaining everything" scene where the Doctor claims to be 450 years old! On the planet Telos Professor Parry's expedition have blasted free rock revealing the doors to the city. Kaftan, partner of the expedition's financier Kleig offers a reward for the first man to open the doors. A crewman tries and is electrocuted. The Tardis lands and it's crew are swiftly found & apprehended. The expedition are explaining they are searching for the remains of the Cybermen. The Doctor insists on staying and after he checks that the electrical charge on the door has been diffused he gets Toberman, Kaftan's servant, to open the doors to the city. The Doctor uses the logic controls to open the two inner doors leaving the central hatch closed.

Eric Klieg: Doctor, you seem to be very familiar with this place.
The Doctor: Oh no, not really, um, it's all based on symbolic logic, the same as you use in computers. The opening mechanism to this door, an or-gate you call it.
Eric Klieg: Yes yes, I can see that, but how did you know in the first place?
The Doctor: Oh, I used my own special technique.
Eric Klieg: Oh really Doctor, and may we know what that is?
The Doctor: Keeping my eyes open and my mouth shut.

Klieg is left to try to open the door. Victoria, Kaftan & Viner find a room containing equipment to revitalise Cybermen. Jamie & Haydon find a room with a dead metallic giant silverfish like creature in. Klieg is defeated by the equations necessary to open the central hatch but the Doctor points him towards a solution. Kaftan causes Victoria to be trapped in the Revitalising machine. Haydon ties some controls in their room causing a hypnotic pattern to appear. The Doctor tried to release Victoria. Jamie is hypnotised by the pattern but Haydon turns it off. They think it's a target range. They run the program again as the Doctor frees Victoria. The Doctor runs into the room Jamie's in as a Cyberman figure appears from nowhere and Haydon is shot, his smoking body falling to the floor.

It's "Doctor Who does Curse of the Pharaohs". Obviously inspired by the Howard Carter "Tutankhamun" expedition and Mummy horror films this episode is exactly that: penetrate an ancient tomb, only on an alien planet rather than in Egypt, and work out how to get through the sealed doors and past the traps. Of course in the horror films once you find the Mummy it wakes up and rises from it's tomb so I think we can guess what's going to happen. Troughton's superb in this, lots of great lines baiting Klieg who he takes an instant dislike to.

I'm pretty certain I've seen the hypnotic targeting effect in this episode used in an old 1960s episode of Top of the Pops!

Some of the cast for this story aren't with us for all of it. Bernard Holley played the already deceased Peter Haydon and will return as an Axon in The Claws of Axos. You may have seen him as the Chief Constable in Frost who has a liking for the rogue Inspector. Jim Callum is played by Clive Merrison who returns 20 years later as the Deputy Chief Caretaker in Paradise Towers, and is a far better actor than either of his Doctor Who appearances will et you believe. I don't know anything about Alan Johns who plays Ted Rogers but am required by law to do a 3-2-1 joke at this point. The nervous John Viner is a first Doctor who role for Cyril Shaps who'll be back as Dr. Lennox in The Ambassadors of Death, the ill fated Prof. Herbert Clegg in the first episode of the recently released on DVD Doctor Who: Planet of the Spiders and the Archimandrite in The Androids of Tara, his only role which survives the story he appears in!

Tomb of the Cybermen is currently the earliest complete surviving Troughton story. But it wasn't always this way. We've just finished season 4, of which no complete story remains and there's only 9 episodes remaining. Season 5, the famous season of monsters, was once in much worse shape. At one point just two episodes remained from season 5: The Enemy of the World 3 and the final episode, Wheel in Space 6. Over the years many were returned till at the end of 1991 the BBC's holdings for season 5 consisted of the following:

Abominable Snowmen 2 (returned Feb 1982)
Ice Warriors 1 & 4-6 (all found in a cupboard at the BBC in August 1988)
Enemy of the World 3 (always present)
Web of Fear 1 (returned 1978),
Wheel in Space 3 (returned in April 1984) & 6 (always present)

That's nine episodes present, but still not a complete story (both the same as season 4) and nothing at all from either Tomb of the Cybermen or Fury from the Deep. Then in December 1991 the Film & Video library had a phone call from Asia TV in Hong Kong....

An accident while editing Tomb of the Cybermen episode two meant it has jumped out of sequence - see here for the entry for that episode.

169 The Evil of the Daleks: Episode Seven

EPISODE: The Evil of the Daleks: Episode Seven
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 169
STORY NUMBER: 036
TRANSMITTED: 01 July 1967
WRITER: David Whitaker
DIRECTOR: Derek Martinus and Timothy Combe
SCRIPT EDITOR: Peter Bryant
PRODUCER: Innes Lloyd
FORMAT: CD: Doctor Who: The Evil of the Daleks
TELESNAPS: The Evil of the Daleks: Episode Seven


In the Dalek city, Daleks start to question the orders they have been given. Maxtible is lured out of his cell with the promise of the transmutation machine he craves but passes through an arch that puts the Dalek Factor into him. The Doctor is hypnotised and likewise seemingly converted but the process fails because he isn't human. The Doctor converts the machine to inject the Human factor and then gets the Emperor to order the Daleks through it because the Daleks the human factor has spread from the other three Daleks. The two Dalek factions quickly end up battling each other. Waterfield is killed saving the Doctor's life, while Maxtible kills Kemel. The fighting spreads to the Emperors chamber causing him and the city to be destroyed. Jamie rescues Victoria and she, now orphaned, accompanies them in the Tardis.

Another final episode where it all goes bang bang bang and everything happens at once leaving everyone dead bar the Doctor and his old & new companions. The function of Evil as as a story is to provide a final end for the Daleks removing them from the series so Terry Nation could launch them in their own series. Unfortunately that plan goes awry and the Daleks do return but not for a few years in the program's life, their longest break from the show. While we see the city Daleks killed (again: see The Daleks) we now know there's the possibility of others surviving elsewhere in space. The only thing is the last of, in Dalek terms, is the use of Peter Hawkins for their voice. He'd been with the show since it's second serial but when the Daleks returned they had new voice artists.

Model sequences from this episode survive and can be found on several Doctor Who DVDs.

Evil was the last original series story novelised. It appeared in 1993 and was written by John Peel who tackled many of the outstanding sixties Dalek stories. This left five stories un-novelised for Target books: The Pirate Planet, City of Death, Shada, Resurrection of the Daleks and Revelation of the Daleks. Three are Douglas Adams stories, two are Eric Saward Dalek stories. A tape version of the soundtrack was released in 1992 with narration by Tom Baker, which topped the spoken word charts for sometime, while a CD version was issued in 2004 with narration by Fraser Hinds.

This also brings us to the end of the fourth season if Doctor Who, the only one without a complete story. It used to share this distinction with season five, but it doesn't any more! From tomorrow we'll be starting season five by watching the first episode of the first complete story since the War Machines.